Introduce yourself to Stunning Visuals
It was revealed today as part of Minecraft Live that Minecraft will be receiving a graphical upgrade in the near future titled “Stunning Visuals,” which is expected to be available on a variety of platforms including Xbox consoles.
Stunning Visuals aims to deliver “enhanced visual features such as directional lighting, volumetric fog, and more,” while also remaining true to the team’s artistic vision, and the result is forecasted to be visually impressive.
The outcome is remarkable – shadows shift as the sun moves across the sky, water reflects the surrounding landscape, and clouds seem infinite as they extend into the horizon.
Improvements like volumetric lighting allow you to see the sun’s rays pierce through the Overworld, and each block will cast its own shadow. Light will filter through your windows, and you’ll be able to witness reflections in water and on the surfaces of metal blocks, while subsurface scattering adds a soft glow to leaves and grass. Creatures and items will also exhibit more illumination – spiders’ eyes will be even more ominous in the dark, and torches will cast a vibrant pathway back to your creation. You can observe this in action in the deepest darkness, as well.
As it stands, there is no announcement yet regarding a release date for Stunning Visuals in Minecraft; however, testing will begin for selected Minecraft: Bedrock Edition devices shortly. Mojang Studios expresses its ambition to implement Stunning Visuals to “as many devices as possible” (either fully or partially), but no further details have been shared thus far.
For those who might be curious